Page 84 of Silver Sweet

Phoenix is rigid. He’s stopped moving for once. Until he wets his lips, then he faces forward and backs away from me like I’m a bomb. “Fuck,” he mutters.

I peek backward, just to see him palm the erection bearing against his pants.Damn.

His eyes knife me. “Shut the fuck up.”

I’m smirking. “That’s what you get for closing in on me. Keep your distance if you don’t want a raging hard-on.”

“Don’t act like you didn’t want me there.”

I flip him off, about to pressplayon Track Threewhen the door whips open and both Jeremy and Gage enter the booth.

“Tom, you’re up,” Gage says. “We need your vocals.”

Without looking backward, I do my job. Which isn’t even a job, really. It’s been the fuel inside my soul.

19

PHOENIX ST. PIERRE

Jeremy, Gage, and I stand in the control room while Tom records in the studio. His hands cup either side of his headphones while he sings into a powerful, agonized scream like he’s being ripped into ten pieces.

I’m obsessed when he does this.

Fucking transfixed. I want a replay.Fuck,I have replayed that scream on my laptop until my ears ached.

Gage chews hard on a piece of gum. “And that’s why Riot won’t drop him.”

Yeah. Tom Cobalt is one of a kind, and the fact that he knows it is stillfuckingirritating. But I’m starting to realize how much I like him festering under my skin.

He gave me a fucking boner at work. He just made me want to drop to my knees and claw at my hair in a sick amount of concern. I have never…haveneverfelt this awake after not sleeping. I’m going to be miserable later, that’s certain, but right now, adrenaline is coursing through me like I’m on speed.

It’s frustrating.

It’s maddening.

It’s annihilating me on every possible level.

Even if he’s bad for me, I never want to quit him, but I can’t have him mirroring my shitty sleep schedule. I can’t do that to him. So while he may hate it, I’m at least ecstatic he slept last night.

I crane my head backward toward my manager. “Jere?”

He stops slurping Fizz through a straw.

“You knew Tom’s old bassist?” I ask. “That Warner guy?”That motherfucker.

“Oh yeah.” His tone gives nothing away. A complete professional. No shit talking to be had. He’s just smiling like he knows my curiosity is running rampant.

“What was he like?” I ask him. “Honestly.”

“Honestly.” Jeremy glances at Tom who pauses between takes to swig water. “He was a decent bassist, but he was holding Tom back. It was good they ended things, just not the way they did.” He nods toward him, which draws my gaze to Tom on the other side of the window. “He was never going to let Warner go.”

My frown deepens, and I watch Tom bob his head to the music in his headphones and approach the mic. He can’t hear this conversation in the booth. “Why?” I ask Jere.

“You don’t know the Cobalts very well, do you?”

No.“Just this one.”

“Loyalty runs deeper than their ambition. He’d been playing with Warner since he was fourteen. He wasn’t going to ditch his friend, even at the chance of success. It was going to take Warner quitting on him for that to change.”